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Friday, November 27, 2015

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Me and my girls spent a no frills day with a scaled down Thanksgiving dinner, a movie (the final Hunger Games Mockingjay 2) and just time together talking about what we have to be thankful for -- mostly each other! In Hanaly Corners, the new Pastor arrived with his family. Here they are hoping that all of our readers spent a wonderful Thanksgiving (if you celebrate it!) with family and friends.

Welcome Pastor Timothy Donally, his wife Miranda, 15 year old Daughter McKenna and twins Jacob and Jezebel (Jez) age 8 to Hanaly Corners!

Wednesday, November 18, 2015

Yes, I purchased the Made to Move Barbie dolls from Amazon.com. I decided that I like them so much, that I would do a review on them. I did purchase multiples of each of them so I would have them for body swapping. Some of my Flickr friends have blamed me for them not being able to get a doll, but I say, you snooze, you lose! Oh well, they will have more available soon!

Hear No Evil, See No Evil, Speak No Evil

There are 3 versions of the Made to Move Barbies. Theresa has a tan skintone, Barbie has a medium caucasian skintone and Lea has a pale Asian skintone. According to the photos on the box, there will also be an AA skintone with the Asha facemold. Speculation is that she will have the Grace skintone. Overall, these dolls for me are a win-win. Their articulation is spectacular and I say to Mattel it is about time. The current dolls are an early release and have only been available on Amazon and eBay. From the Amazon Barbie Store, they were $14.99 each, and have sold out. There are still private sellers on Amazon and on eBay that have them, but they are asking between $30 to $75 for them. Because the official release of these dolls is supposed to be in January, I would recommend waiting, however, do keep your eyes open as there have been reports of them being available in some TRU stores at $14.99 and Amazon may get more in stock. If Mattel is smart, they will make them available in time for Christmas.As you can see from the above photo, they have very flexible joints. They are double jointed at both the elbows and the knees and have jointed ankles, thighs, upper arms and torso. I will show some picture later of them naked so you can see all of the points of articulation. The good news is that the joints are all nice and tight, the doll is sturdy and well constructed. The only negative I see so far is that the hair in the Lea and Barbie versions is extremely glue laden. I had a couple of them where the glue had dripped down the neck! When you take the head off of the prong, the prong is sticky with glue and there are chucks of glue that come out with it. So far, all of the Theresa molds that I opened did not have any glue at all in the head. I do hope that they remedy this problem for Lea and Barbie in the production release.I have done some comparisons to other jointed dolls that I have, which include a Barbie Style body, a Liv body and a PlayToy Action Figure body. I have tried to put each of them in a comparable pose, but as you will see, they could not all do every pose.Here you see each doll crossing her arms in front of her chest. Playtoy says she cannot get her arms close to her because she has such a large bosom (I gave her that one). Made to Move can not only cross her arms in front, but she can get them close to her body. Liv does a decent job, but she cannot get her arms as close to her chest as Made to Move. Barbie Style can cross them, but not tight to her chest. Made to Move is the winner in this category!

Next they tried putting their hands on their faces. This would be helpful for holding a phone to talk on it, for putting on make up or doing your hair! Made to Move can put her hands on her face, actually in many positions. Play Toy can also touch her face, but not at as low of a point on her face as Made to Move. Barbie Style, she says: "Ummm, this is giving me a headache!" as does Liv. Once again, Made to Move takes this point!

Excitedly, Made to Move shouts: "How about we get on the floor and do some yoga poses?!" Liv and Playtoy look at her and say, "What?! Are you nuts?!" and Barbie Style looks at her as says: "This will have to do!" Made to Move is grinning inside and whispers: "Yes! I win again!"

The next move is to sit on their legs on the floor. Barbie Style: "I stoop to noone!" and she just kneels. Made to move and Play Toy are pretty equal in this pose. Liv is pretty close, but cannot quite sit all of the way down. This one is a tie between Made to Move and Play Toy.

Warning: Dolly nudity!

Ok, if you are still with us, they are now posing nude so a comparison can be made based on the aesthetics of each doll's body.First up, we have Barbie Style. Her body appearance is very nice and smooth. Her joints are subtle and do not detract from her pleasant appearance. The Made to Move joints are much more obvious, but to me, I do not thing they detract from her appearance. Some find that the upper arm joint makes her look too muscular, but I actually find this look attractive as you can tell she takes care of her body and works out! The inside of her elbow joints are a little obvious, but not overly so. The joint I find the least attractive on her is the upper thigh joint, but the trade off of her ability to pose in so many positions make it worth it! Play Toy has a very attractive body. As with many Action Figures, her joints are more obvious, but the fact that you can exchange her hands and feet give her more expressive posing options. She can hold a drink, shoot a gun or even point at you! For me, the Liv body is probably the least aesthetically pleasing, however, it is a less mature body and is good to use for younger characters. I do like its versatility as a body exchange option.

Rear view! They are all fairly equal when looking at them from behind! The least noticeable knee joint is probably Barbie Style, then Liv, Made to Move takes third and Play Toy takes last place in this category. Only because the joints are more noticeable. However. I also find that Play Toy's elbow and wrist joints are somewhat less attractive than the others, but her butt is probably the most realistic and aesthetically pleasing butt! All in all, I will take the looks of these joints over not having any at all!

With that, Barbie Style, Play Toy and Liv bid us farewell and my very favorite poseable body gal stops in for a cameo appearance. The Phicen Stainless Steel skeleton body, to me, is by far the best poseable body around. However, at a pricetag of between $80 to $120, she is also the most expensive. Here she goes head to head with Made to Move on the merits of poseability:

My medium bust Phicen, Stephanie, pulls up a chair and invites Made to Move to curl up like her. Made to move can match her pose quite well!

Stephanie says: "Try this!" as she stretches out a bit in the chair. Once again, Made to Move excels at the challenged pose!

Stephanie says: "Not bad at all! Now get on the floor and do this!" Stephanie gets on the floor and pushes herself up with her arms and arches her back gracefully. Made to Move has a little difficulty arching her back, but Stephanie commends her on her ability in this area!

Stephanie is impressed with this $15 doll and her ability to pose. She does one more pose on the floor. This one she says is a magazine or book reading position. Made to Move thinks, "Yes, I can do this too!" but secretly she thinks she would rather read a book or magazine curled up on the couch next to a fireplace with some hot cocoa to drink!

Made to Move gets her street clothes back on and waits for her boyfriend to come and pick her up. I think she looks great in this outfit. She looks like a girl who takes care of herself and keeps her body toned. Her arms are shapely with a hint of muscularity. She is looking good!

Her boyfriend Liam also appreciates her efforts to stay healthy and look good. He, for one, is very happy she has joined him in Hanaly Corners!

Liam with his Made to Move sweetheart. He says, "Give her a name already!" I do hope you enjoyed my review and photos. Thanks for stopping by. I enjoy receiving your comments!

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

I have seen others transform their dolls by removing the factory hair and flocking new hair on. When I saw a tutorial on YouTube: How to Turn OHC Girl into a Boy - Flocking TutorialI decided to give it a try my self.I have multiples of the Happy Family Grandma dolls, so to make them look differently, I have done some different hair treatments for them. I had purchased a long grey wig for another doll and after cutting it to a shorter length, I had quite a bit of hair left over. I used this to make my flocking. I also decided that she needed a nice looking mature fellow as her partner, so I took an extra Finnick doll I had purchased at a discount to use as a body donor and gave him some flocking as well. Below is the couple out for their wedding anninversary:

Happy Family Grandma with a "mature" Finnick as her husband!

All dressed up for their anniversary!

I also wanted to give her more mobility since her man is very mobile, so I did a leg transplant on her. See her new legs:

Her new legs gives her a new lease on life! She can really kick up her heels now!

Her husband likes them too!

After seeing how well the flocking experiment worked out, I decided to give my AA Happy Family Grandma a new man too. So I took the head of an AA University Ken doll whose body had already been snatched and put it on a tall COO Model body. I left his current flocking intact, but added my salt and pepper grey flocking to his head and face too. Check out this guy!

Here they are! Grandma has been rebodied on an AA Liv body. I also gave her hair a trim. She is the younger sister of my other AA Happy Family Grandma who is married to AA Happy Family Grandpa

Here is a closer look at his face. I noticed that some of his beard rubbed off, but that will be easy to fix!

I also purchased the Disney Athena character from Tomorrowland. I thought she would look good as my Katie Lamm's little sister (my Lammily doll). What do you think? I still need to give her a name.

Sunday, November 8, 2015

I don't often win contests, but I did have a bit of luck this year. During Brini's birthday celebration, I won her give-a-way contest and received a wonderful pool from her. With everything that has been going on in my life with health and other issues, I never did post the picture of my dolls enjoying the pool! So, without further delay, here is the picture of my dolls enjoying the pool we won from Brini. Brini, I am sorry it took so long to get this posted, but you know that I was so excited to win this!

My Resort Glam Style Girls enjoying the pool I received from Brini in February!

Another item I won was the bag from Atelierni Shasha. It is so well made, even my daughters were impressed! I loved it so much, that I decided to buy some clothes from Shasha as well. Here are photos of the fashions I purchased as well as the bag I won!

My Lady Tremaine doll in a top and skirt purchased from Atelierni Shasha. She is rebodied (again!) on a Poppy Parker Japan skin tone body

Here is Lady Tremaine holding the bag I won from Shasha!

Here is a top and pants I purchased from Atelierni Shasha

I have taken a lot more photos along the way, so I will be getting out a few more posts within the next couple of weeks. Thank you, Shasha, for the lovely bag and thank you for being such a talented clothing designer and seamstress! My dolls and I will be enjoying these for a long time to come!

Saturday, November 7, 2015

I haven't posted in a while, but I did what to be sure to share photos of clothing I received from the very generous Shasaringnis. You can check out her blog at: Shasarignis Barbie & Co. You should know that all of her clothing is hand made -- literally! She doesn't have a sewing machine, so she hand sews every stitch! I am amazed at the quality of her work and the evenness of her stitches. She contacted me after I posted one of the dolly blog award answers and asked if she could sent me some clothes that she made. Of course, I was more than happy to say yes! She sent me several items -- mostly made for the Lammily doll and some for Fashion Royalty (can be worn by FR or CI dolls). Here are some photos of the outfits she sent to me!For Fashion Royalty:

Check out the large bag! She can use it as an overnight bag!

This is 2 pieces!

Back view

This dress is reversible!

This is the reverse side

A nice warm coat for Lammily! My Katie says this is just what she needs for the winter!

Back of coat

Side view of coat

Felt hooded jacket. Katie says she can wear this to the football games!

Skirt and jacket. Katie is wearing a Lammily top with this. The skirt is a wrap-a-round.

Strapless white dress

Yellow and pink satin dress. Katie says she might wear white or yellow leggings with this, but she can't wait to wear it out!

About Me

I have always loved Barbie dolls. I got my first doll at the age of 8 or 9 and she was a platinum bubble cut Barbie. As an adult, I have discovered the world of doll collecting and playing with them as an adult through several doll blogs. My interests now have expanded beyond Barbie to Fashion Royalty, Mixis, Pretty Girls and other 1:6 scale dolls and action figures. I am also an avid crafter and can sew, so I have been incorporating these hobbies into my doll world as well. I am happy to share my collection through photographs and stories on my blog.